We Kept a Rusty Old Shed and Made It Our Home

Look, I am going to tell you the truth. My family initially informed our friends that we were constructing a house around an old and rusty sheds Ballarat, which made them believe that we had gone mad.

Why have you a hog of an eyesore?

"You're spending good money to live in a scrap heap?"

Just knock it down and begin afresh.

But we did not hear. And with that God be thanked. It is due to that rusty old shed that our home has won awards today. That is why people stop on the shoulder of the road to do photos. And that is why I get up in the morning to experience that I do not live in a place that is not real, but in a place that is not fake and ideal.

Let me go a little further round and explain how all this came about.

The Day We Fell in Love With a Wreck

The property was discovered accidentally. It wasn't fancy. It was dry and dusty land. The outhouse behind was a shambles. The former owner had tossed it with any material they could find. Nothing was straight. The roof had dents. In spots the walls were rusting away.

Every right-minded individual would have done so.

Something about that shed got into my skin. Perhaps it was the evening light, which made the rust look orange and red. Perhaps it was its sincerity. It was no attempt of that shed to impress. It was simply there, doing its work, disintegrating gradually and not worrying about what anybody might think.

I looked at my partner and told him, What it we kept it?

They believed I was playing a joke.

I wasn't.

Locating an Architect Who was not Crazy

It is difficult to find an architect to work on such a project. Majority of them desire to create glass boxes or white cubes. They desire their work to appear fresh and new to them in order to place them in magazines.

We did not desire new and fresh. We desired old and shabby.

We later discovered the group at Judd Lysenko Marshall Architects. We did not present them with images of fancy kitchens when we sat down with them. And we presented them pictures of old barnsheds. We demonstrated rust to them on deserted equipment. We demonstrated to them how weather and time make things beautiful.

The chief architect listened attentively. Then he had something to say which I will never forget: you want your house to look like it is already falling down, and in a good way?

"Exactly," I said.

He smiled. "That's a first for us."

The One Rule We Refused to Break

We gave the architects one rule. Just one. But it was non-negotiable.

Keep the shed. Build the house around it.

No tearing it down. No moving it to a different spot. No covering it up with new materials. That old, rusty, poorly built shed had to stay right where it was, and it had to be the heart of the new house.

The architects thought we were making their job harder. And they were right. But they also understood why we wanted it. That shed had soul. You can't buy that at a hardware store.

So they went to work figuring out how to attach a brand new family home to a crooked old shack without everything falling apart.

Learning About the Magic Rust

Here's something I didn't know before this project. There's a type of steel called Corten steel. It rusts on purpose. But unlike normal rust that eats through metal and destroys it, Corten's rust forms a protective layer. So it looks rusty and orange forever, but it never gets weaker.

When the architects showed us a sample, we went a bit crazy. I started collecting every rusty thing I could find. Old buckets. Rusty wheelbarrows. Discarded metal sheets from farm dumps. I lined them all up in our garage just to look at the different colors.

My lover laughed at me. You have become a rust collector, they said.

They weren't wrong.

But that obsession was fruitful. The entire house was covered with Corten steel. The walls appear as though they have been in the weather fifty years. But they're strong. They will last longer than most new houses made of ordinary material.

The Hard Part Nobody Talks About.

I will not say this was easy.

It was a nightmare to find builders capable of welding heavy steel panels. Majority of the tradies would glance at our plans and walk away. Too weird, one of them replied. Too much bother, said another.

It was also necessary to persuade the council that it was a good idea to have a rusty shed. They were asking us to clean up all that stuff and get it pretty and tidy. We had to reiterate and reiterate that the rust was the whole thing.

I questioned myself whether our friends were correct or not, there were days. Maybe we were nuts. Perhaps we ought to have simply knocked the house down and erected something ordinary like everybody.

However, I would also stroll around the property during the late afternoon. Just the sun would strike that old shed. The rust would shine. The shadows would be long on the ground. And I would recall why we embarked on this mad pursuit in the first place.

What We Learned

The house is completed. It's won awards. Foreign architects have requested that they can see our plans. But honestly? It is not so much about that stuff.

It is what the house is like when you are inside it. It does not seem like a museum. It does not look like a show house. It is as though you can have your feet on the coffee table and you do not have to worry about scuffing the floor. It feels lived-in. It feels real.

When you happen to be gazing at sheds Ballarat or any other place, you see my suggestion is plain. Be not too swift to strip away. The problem may seem to be that old shed on your property. But it could well be the finest thing about your new home.

Our shed was rusty. It was crooked. It was not well constructed. And we like it better than any fancy kitchen or new room in the house.

The Honest Truth

Oh, I do not mean that everybody has to go down and build a house around a rusty shed. It would be absurd. But I am telling you that that is not true, old and worn is not useless. Quit thinking that perfect and new is better.

Our home is not the best because we purchased it at a showroom. It is what we rescued out of the dump. And when I see those rusty walls I get glad we were too obstinate to pay heed to people who believed we were crazy.

The things in life that are the best are sometimes what everyone else advised you to discard.